Two Sisters Bookery

The Cape Fear Book Shelf

Books about the Cape Fear.

Seaboard to Sideboard: A Collection of Recipes from the Junior League of Wilmington, North Carolina
by Junior League of Wilmington
This fabulous cookbook captures the timeless tastes and traditions of Wilmington and the Cape Fear area. Mouthwatering recipes, breathtaking photographs, and historical tidbits grace the pages of this local keepsake. The official cookbook of the North Carolina Azalea Festival. A 1999 South Regional Winner of the Tabasco Community Cookbook Award.

Not Your Typical Travelogue

From Alaska to Angola, the mighty ocean to the open road, these titles will enthrall you - and inspire you.

Bay of Tigers: An African Odyssey
by Mendes, Pedro Rosa, Mendes, Landers, Clifford
Portuguese journalist Mendes traveled 6,000 miles across Africa in 1997, from Angola to Mozambique. In Angola, he found himself immersed in a state still rife with violence and unrest, a place littered with landmines, despite the fact Angola became independent in 1974. Mendes writes vividly and compassionately of the people he met, from villagers to soldiers, corrupt government officials to international relief workers. He provides a recounting of Angola's history (including a glossary), and relates his astute observations and the incredible stories told to him by the people he encountered on his difficult journey - one that was ultimately rewarding, because he was able to let the world know about the people of Angola.

On the Bedside Table: Lists of What We're Reading

This is our section for lists--lists of what we are reading, what we have read, what we want to read, and what we want you to read. There are the books cluttering up our bedside tables, and the books we think should be cluttering up yours!

The Ruby in Her Navel: A Novel of Love and Intrigue in the 12th Century
by Unsworth, Barry
For fans of Dorothy Dunnett's rich Lymond Chronicles. Barry Unsworth always surprises and delights me with the way he packs so much meaning and emotional intensity into the simplest of sentences.--Nicki

Set in the Middle Ages during the brief yet glittering rule of the Norman kings, "The Ruby in Her Navel" is a tale in which the conflicts of the past portend the present. The novel opens in Palermo, in which Latin and Greek, Arab and Jew live together in precarious harmony. Thurstan Beauchamp, the Christian son of a Norman knight, works for Yusuf, a Muslim Arab, in the palace's central finance office, a job which includes the management of blackmail and bribes, and the gathering of secret information for the king. But the peace and prosperity of the kingdom is being threatened, internally as well as externally. Known for his loyalty but divided between the ideals of chivalry and the harsh political realities of his tumultuous times, Thurstan is dispatched to uncover the conspiracies brewing against his king. During his journeys, he encounters the woman he loved as a youth; and the renewed promise of her love, as well as the mysterious presence of an itinerant dancing girl, sends him on a spiritual odyssey that forces him to question the nature of his ambition and the folly of uncritical reverence for authority. With the exquisite prose and masterful narrative drive that have earned him widespread acclaim, Barry Unsworth transports the reader to a distant past filled with deception and mystery, and whose racial, tribal, and religious tensions are still with us today.

The Secret Store: What You Might Find on the Shelves

How do you recreate the cozy, crowded atmosphere of a little shop on a website? The Secret Store is our way of giving you an idea of what you might see on the shelves if you happened to wander in and just started browsing. Every odd shelf seems to have its own little display or collection of books. Every time you turn a corner, you see something new!

Wizard of the Crow
by Thiong'o, Ngugi Wa
From the exiled Kenyan novelist, playwright, poet, and literary critic--a magisterial comic novel that is certain to take its place as a landmark of postcolonial African literature.
In exile now for more than twenty years, Ngugl wa Thiong'o has become one of the most widely read African writers of our time, the power and scope of his work garnering him international attention and praise. His aim in "Wizard of the Crow" is, in his own words, nothing less than "to sum up Africa of the twentieth century in the context of two thousand years of world history."
Commencing in "our times" and set in the "Free Republic of Aburlria," the novel dramatizes with corrosive humor and keenness of observation a battle for control of the souls of the Aburlrian people. Among the contenders: His High Mighty Excellency; the eponymous Wizard, an avatar of folklore and wisdom; the corrupt Christian Ministry; and the nefarious Global Bank. Fashioning the stories of the powerful and the ordinary into a dazzling mosaic, "Wizard of the Crow" reveals humanity in all its endlessly surprising complexity.
Informed by richly enigmatic traditional African storytelling, "Wizard of the Crow" is a masterpiece, the crowning achievement in Ngugl wa Thiong'o's career thus far.

What's Happening

Two Sisters may be a small store, but it has big ideas! We host a full schedule of events and author appearances, both in the store and off site.

Interview: Natsuo Kirino (Out)

Natsuo Kirino's English-language debut is the incredible, award-winning Out.

OUT
by Natsuo Kirino
OUT was awarded the Grand Prix of the Mystery Writers of Japan in 1997-the Asian equivalent of an Edgar.
It is a dynamic example of the work of a new breed of Asian women writers excelling in the smart, hard-nosed, well-written, and realistically plotted mystery novel. Kirino' crime story can stand comparison with the work of other top-notch Western women writers in this genre, like Sarah Paretsky and Ruth Rendell.
The story-though a bare summary makes it seem merely brutal and bloodthirsty, when it is much more than that-focuses on four women who work together in a lunch-box factory in the suburbs of Tokyo. One of them suffers from spouse abuse and, unable to take it any longer, murders her husband and appeals to her co-workers to help her dispose of the corpse. One of these friends---the brain behind the coverup-after cutting up the body in the bathroom of her house, has the other two dump it as garbage. The money from the man's life insurance is then divided among them. But this is only the beginning. The successful, unpremeditated crime and the rewards it brings are the seed of other, premeditated schemes, escalating from one localized use of violence to a rash of similar deeds, with unpredictable outcomes for the women behind them.
As a study in the psychology of domestic repression and the dynamics of violent crime, OUT works on several levels, gripping the reader from its smoldering beginning to the fireburst of its finale.
In hardcover in its original language it sold over 300,000 copies, and a movie version will have its premiere in Tokyo at the end of 2002, with international distribution under discussion.

DeeGee's: The Oldest Independent Bookstore in the Carolinas

On January 1, 2007, feeling that her life was not complicated enough, Cathy Stanley purchased DeeGee's Books & Gifts in Morehead City. In doing so, she took on what may be the oldest continuously-running bookstore in the Carolinas.

Indie Next List

Unique and provocative selections from a great diversity of voices...all personally recommended by the independent booksellers of America.

The Melancholy Fate of Capt. Lewis
by Pritchett, Michael
"High school history teacher Bill Lewis, in the midst of writing a book about explorer Meriwether Lewis, reveals that he shares the historic Lewis trait of depression and madness. Fascinated by the hellish adventures of Captain Lewis, morbidly drawn to the downward spiral of his biographer, I read to the end, as Bill Lewis glimpses a ray of hope for his sanity, his son, and his marriage." --Gina Webb, Tall Tales Book Shop, Atlanta, GA